"What an incentive to a pure life," she quickly added.
"Talking of wings, do you object if I see more closely the cut and style of your wings? I never saw before a human creature possessing a pair."
After a moment"s hesitancy she raised her right arm and with it the one wing unfolded. I ventured near enough to see the intricate network of muscle and bone woven around the arm and filling the s.p.a.ce between the raised arm and the side of Plume"s body. She was surprised at the interest I manifested in the human wing. After this she offered to furnish an able escort to conduct me to several points of interest.
All this I declined and informed my talented friend that I must hasten away to another world.
"Let me go with you," she strongly insisted.
"Your wings are not of the right kind," I replied hurriedly.
"They are strong enough to bear us both," were her inviting words.
"But not beyond the atmosphere of this world," I explained.
I quietly arose, scanned once more the beautiful valley before me, and indicated that I was about to wane into the invisible. Then did her womanly nature a.s.sert its supremacy and she, for the first time, touched my hand imploringly:
"Have I been dreaming, or do my eyes deceive me? How can all this be true? Your hand is sensible to my touch. I implore you to remain until I speak to you more about the sciences of your world."
In all my journey I never yielded to persuasion before. But somehow I consented to spend a season longer of most charming fellowship, talking of the elements in nature, their chemical affinities, and the laws of matter and mind. Plume was unusually bright in the philosophies, and I gathered from her many truths which had always before been hidden to me.
Finally I became rigid in my determination to leave, for I knew that I could not stay.
"Grant me one request," she begged.
"Let me hear it."
"Promise me that you will return."
"Impossible, impossible!"
The parting that followed was indeed memorable. Without any further notice I suddenly vanished, but still tarried invisibly in close proximity.
Plume was now left in deep bewilderment, and I could not even conjecture the details of her warring thoughts. Finally I saw that for which I had tarried. Plume lifted her wings and flew skyward as beautifully and gracefully as any bird of our earthly air.
CHAPTER XXII.
Heaven.
After my ambition to visit one thousand worlds had been realised, and I was darting toward the confines of our own little Solar System, instinctively I looked out once more over the vast stretches of s.p.a.ce.
All around me, at amazing distances, loomed up the millions of spheres which I had not visited by reason of my limited time. I felt like some one who, after gaining his first thousand dollars, has a wild craving to acc.u.mulate ten or one hundred thousand more.
Still I scanned the heavens while deeper longings pervaded my soul.
While in this mood the most unusual vision flashed upon my eyes.
Suddenly I forgot whither I was going and in wild astonishment I drank in the first view of Heaven. Inwardly I marveled that I had not seen at least a part of it before.
Heaven is fashioned on a transcendently large scale. It is not a single sphere, but a universal chain of vast and luminous star-groups, scattered harmoniously throughout the infinite regions of s.p.a.ce, so that a part of it lies suspended preciously near to our own Solar System.
Heaven is more real and substantial than the suns and planets of the universe, although not one of its numberless parts can be detected by the human eye, or discerned through a telescope. These luminous...o...b.. that const.i.tute Heaven control the movements of the planets, suns and systems which we call material. They are whiter than snow and shine with a l.u.s.ter not dazzling, but restful to the eye capable of seeing them.
How this glimpse put to naught all my former crude conceptions of Heaven, and if I found myself unable to describe the wonders of many a dark world which I have visited, how much less could I portray the vastly superior beauties of Heaven which are so far beyond the glory of dark, rugged worlds that I felt an inexpressible desire to take up my abode there at once and to remain forever.
Inwardly I shouted for joy as this new light illumined my face, and I loathed to think of proceeding on my journey to any sin-cursed world of the universe, for the ties of kinship, friendship, and earthship all vanished at the sight of such resplendent spheres.
THE GREATNESS OF HEAVEN.
There is no language to be employed that can fitly describe the parts of Heaven I saw, and I know that the greater glory was curtained from my view. But the size of the l.u.s.trous...o...b.. is not equaled by the large material suns that blaze in the depth of immensity. Heaven"s diamond splendor extended as far as my una.s.sisted eyes could reach, and according to the way it appeared it must extend without limit.
It would require one hundred millions of years for a child of G.o.d to take one excursion trip to the physical worlds of our universe. Then there are millions of such universes, (I know of no better name to use) each one occupying its own immense stretches of s.p.a.ce. These universes average about sixteen hundred millions of worlds each.
Heaven is infinitely greater than this whole material fabric, so that if a spirit is inclined to travel, he will need all eternity to study the works of G.o.d as displayed in the glorious abodes of Heaven and in the changing aspects of created worlds.
Let us give a deeper meaning to the stanza of the poet by subst.i.tuting "million" for "thousand."
When I"ve been there ten million years, Bright, shining as the sun, I"ve no less days to sing G.o.d"s praise, Than when I first begun.
Compared with this life more vast, does it not appear that our own insignificant existence on our tiny Earth is as the creeping of a mere insect on the leaf of a giant oak?
PERMANENCY OF HEAVEN.
The only permanent or imperishable feature of our universe is the Heaven part of it. The created or visible worlds are mere dark appendages of the real spheres, and are serving their parts in bringing fruit to their Maker.
Sin-cursed and sinless worlds are coming to an end continually, and as rapidly are new ones flung out or old ones re-peopled to serve as garden plots to bear fruit in the form of created intelligences who serve and admire G.o.d through choice.
Heaven is indestructible. It has already been in existence since the morning of time. In all my journey, no angel or mortal could tell me how many cycles ago that was. But it must be said that Heaven does not always present the same aspect. Mansions are built for the reception of new arrivals, or for the vast delegations from millennial worlds.
THE INHABITANTS OF HEAVEN.
They come from all parts of the universe, from millions of spheres. The righteous of any world, at death, are suddenly transported to that part of Heaven lying nearest to their world. This is the Abraham"s bosom where the spirit is happy until it takes up its abode with its own spiritualized body in a millennial reign, after which, by a decree of the Final Judgment, it is given its credentials to the illimitable life of all Heaven.
This is Paul"s third heaven. Oh! what unlimited expansion! What incomprehensible principles, to move at large in quest of universal truths as seen in the seven types of Heaven"s spiritual intelligences, and in the unending manifestations of G.o.d"s work and love as displayed in all heaven and in all the peopled planets of s.p.a.ce!
Not one of these blessed inhabitants ever grows old or suffers fatigue.
They are capable of moving with tireless energy from one part of Heaven"s vast domains to any other portion.
DEGREES OF HEAVEN.
In s.p.a.ce there are many sinless worlds where human species are propagated, not as the result of any s.e.xual affinities, but in a manner totally unintelligible to a finite mind. They who reach Heaven from such a world cannot drink in the same kind of enjoyment as those who come up out of great tribulations from the spheres of a sin-cursed world, and who have struggled for mastery and forged their way to the sky through armies of aliens.
But these creatures are perfectly contented, for they have no way of realizing the glory resulting from the victory over the world, the flesh and the Devil.
Then there are degrees of glory among those who come from a sin-cursed world. Some have many treasures laid up in Heaven, while others centered their affections too much upon the transitory things of time and sense.